lifehack.org: Are you starting school this year with the best intentions in mind?
Or are you on the opposite end, dreading the year because of how much of a grind school can be?
As a high school teacher and former teaching assistant for Queen’s University, I’ve seen and experienced both.
However, school can be a great experience if you develop some habits that will make your life easier.
11 comments:
Normally, these 'helpful tip articles' are kind of redundant and really just tell you things that your common sense should be telling you instead. Like, 'Show up to class on time'. For some reason though this article had many more good points than I was expecting, or at least that I wholeheartedly agree with. Like the ones that tell you to take time for yourselves, but to also be social, because there is a healthy way to both and both are equally important. One that I agree with, that drives me crazy when other students do it, is make excuses. That drives me up a wall because we should be adults and just own our mistakes or bad choices. Especially if it is something that is not even that serious and that you can remedy; like being late or forgetting homework. I think that an experience like college doesn't have to be painful, you can have fun with it, you just have to work hard and be honest with yourself in order to do it.
Yes Sonia! I absolutely agree with your opening comment! I clicked on this expecting to see the same old tips that are easy to write blog comments on because they are the same thing you've read for the past 5 years of your life. But not so! First off, I love that they broke their tips into 5 sections, each with 3 easy-to-remember tips. I'm also very grateful to see new ones. I had never thought about drinking water throughout your work. I automatically think of soda or coffee to keep us awake but water makes much more sense. My favorite tip, however, is to take walks by yourself or find personal time everyday. This is something that was virtually impossible freshman year. This year I'm learning that that tip is perhaps the most important of all.
Oh Lifehacker, I love you, but sometimes you're just not enough for me. I've had people shoving those tips down my throat since first grade. And, maybe I'm dense, I try, I really do, but there are some I STILL can't get into the swing of. Particularly, and this is an embarrassing one, the use of a calendar. I am all about calendars. I make them for groups, projects, shows, everything. Except my personal life. Maybe I just need a refuge from them, but I sort of feel bad about it. I don't feel like my life is spiraling out of conrol though, I don't often forget things and am normally fairly calm. It could still be of use though....maybe I'll try again this year.....
I feel obligated here to fulfill my role as curmudgeonly old grad student, so here goes:
While a great deal of these tips ARE worth knowing, telling the vast majority of college freshman to budget your year's expenses [Finance Habits #1-3] is about as likely to be effective as telling your cat to get down off the dining room table. Sure, it can hear words coming out of your mouth and it's reasonably sure you're talking directly to it, but it doesn't really understand what you're saying and it doesn't care either as it gets easily distracted...ooo! something shiny to bat around! In the end, the only way to teach it is to squirt it with a water bottle OR watch as it has to live off Ramen and Saltines from April to June.
It's not that these "habits" aren't useful, but the greatest lessons I learned in my undergrad did NOT come from a classroom; and it wouldn't have mattered who had told me these lessons or how often, I had to learn them myself in order for them to stick. Perhaps I was just a stubborn young adult and now I'm a bitter old adult, and certainly SOME students will be able to take a great many of these lessons to heart, but I suspect most will not until it's too late.
While I've heard many of these tips before, I always find myself needing to hear them again. It's important that these are described as "habits". One of the problems that I have been running into as I try to get back into the swing of things this school year is that I have not yet gotten a system in place to operate off of. We are creatures of habit and it's very easy to develop bad habits without even noticing it. Putting positive habits such as the ones described in this article can take a lot of work, but that work will undoubtedly pay off in the end. On a more specific note, one tip from this article that I hadn't heard before was to drink water while studying to help with concentration. That seems like a much healthier alternative than pumping coffee. In the end, most of this article wasn't new to me, but it was all good to hear. I'm thankful for the people who have gone before me who drill these tips into my head.
I'm going to agree with Jake on this one. This article did go into slightly more detail than other similar lists (which have jewels of knowledge like "Go to sleep earlier" and "Read the assignments") so in that way, it's good, I guess. But in reality, this whole list is an elaboration on things that everyone in college already knows. Everyone knows that going to class is important, eating out is way more expensive than making food at home, and you'll probably work better without distractions around you. Seeing something you already know in list form isn't going to be the motivator that gets you to actually start doing the things it suggests. The things I learned to do in undergrad to make my life easier and better I learned by trial and error and making mistakes. And I still don't do half the things I know would make my life easier, so I haven't learned better either.
Ah, the usual school tip article, how I missed thee! I actually really enjoy reading these articles, they can be so so redundant but sometimes I get a helpful tip. Although a lot of this is common sense, I agree that we are creatures of habit, and just hearing some positive tips makes me want to start the year off on the right foot. Even though who knows what will actually happen, It's just interesting to hear tidbits of things that might help me out in the future, its also nice to read all of these tips in groups, like Sam said, it really breaks it down and makes soaking in these facts more helpful. I also like hearing the budgeting tip, I have to be more concious of how I spend my money, the cash only tip is something I have tried in the future and has helped me save money. Its just good to hear again, and be reminded that there's a simple solution that can hopefully be useful!
I don't think these suggestions could be any more simple or condensed into the absolute essentials of having a well-organized and productive school year. I find it funny that I naturally started (this year) doing at least one of the tips on each subheading. Packing a lunch has made a great impact on my wallet, and having a folder for each class has helped me stay organized and saves my back from just carrying the same old huge notebook with every subject in it. I could definitely get used to taking a walk every day too.
Every time I read one of these articles I think about the tips that I have actually managed to implement, and why I managed to work them into my life. I realize that the reason I make an effort to for example get enough sleep, is not that I read about it in a self-improvement article. I make an effort to sleep because I spent enough of the past year as a sleep-deprived zombie that I know to do otherwise is academic and emotional suicide. You can read a million articles about what you ought to do, but until you suffer the consequences of disorganization, sleep deprivation, poor money management, and ineffective work habits, the likelihood that you will actually do anything about it is very low.
what a convenient timed article, organization has always been a struggle for me, be it my living space or my work space. Especially with this year at had keeping myself well organized and working effectively is a major goal. One tip i find rather intriguing is the idea of forgetting the high liter and going with the notes in the margins. Ive never been a high liter man myself, i end up turning the entire page neon yellow or pink. This note along with the suggestions on how to take more useful notes i plan on putting to use. A down fall of my notes is that they only make sense to me and from time to time that might change.
I agree with what many of the people have said before me, these helpful hints are always redundant and yet I read them each time hoping that I would find some new. I always hope that theirs would be some new gem that would shine light on how I can improve. But each time it is the same common sense that I have been hearing since middle school. The only tip that was relatively new was the idea that instead of highlighting you should write notes in the margin instead. I think also that even though we have hears these tips many times we often forget about them, such as the need for balance or personal time.
Post a Comment